Work Text:
A New Year's Dream
If you ask Jung Hoseok if dreams come true, his answer is always, “Maybe.”
Dreams, aspirations, wishes, and many more similar phrases are words that cover the possibility of being given something that you are subconsciously a bit hopeless about.
If you are sure about it, they become goals, targets, future, and ambitions. Hoseok becoming the nation’s beloved doctor is an ambition. Hoseok setting his daily routine to achieve muscles and good physique is a goal. Hoseok working on a schedule with the intent to finish this Friday is a target.
A dream. A wish. It is Hoseok yearning for Yoongi hyung to see that he is worthy of the love of movies, and books. It is to be the one to hold Yoongi hyung close to his chest as he dozes off in his studio couch. It is to want Yoongi hyung to see the way Hoseok’s heart shatters every time he shows up with a list of things that may interest his boyfriend, or girlfriend.
A dream come true.
Hoseok doesn’t believe much in that phase.
Well, at least when it comes to real life. The real visceral mass of a mess that life is.
But maybe New Year’s does bring about new turnings.
Because Hoseok has no idea what to do, now, seeing his best friend, his Yoongi hyung, tears trailing down pallor cheeks on his doorstep at the crack of dawn on New Year’s Eve.
“Hyung?” Hoseok blinks his eyes repeatedly, incredulous at the sight in front of him.
“Oh my God!” Hoseok pulls Yoongi hyung into his chest, out of the cold dawn snow. “It’s okay.” Hoseok shushes the elder.
There are snowflakes in Yoongi hyung’s obsidian locks. At any other moment Hoseok would have found that ethereal, but now his soul is thrashing with the tears soaking his night shirt’s front.
He shuts the door, softly, bringing his arms closer around Yoongi hyung’s form.
His heart bled as the miniscule sniffles echoed in his house. Despite the amount of belongings and pictures adorning the space, and the walls, the sound was louder than the clanging bells from the Church.
The last time Hoseok had held Yoongi hyung so close, in his embrace, was after the elder’s dog had died. And that had broken the allegedly tsundere exterior.
Hoseok cared deeply for his friends. More than a usual person does. He attributed it to the past experiences he has had before.
It wasn’t everywhere that you feel slotted into. Not every place accepts everyone readily.
Hoseok never had that before Bangtan, their own makeshift rebellious band of boys. And he wishes to always stay together, whatever happens. He wants that sense of belonging to a family, without any ‘given that’s, forever.
Hoseok wound himself around his Yoongi hyung, and they rocked together with the rhythm of the clock ticking in its monotonous function. Yoongi hyung finally slipped his own arms around Hoseok, and pressed closer into the crook of the younger man’s neck.
“Hot chocolate?”
“You know I hate sweet things,” sniffling.
“Hot chocolate it is.”
They made their way to the kitchen, Hoseok not letting go of the elder despite moving around to gather and do things.
*
They are cuddled together on Hoseok’s bed.
Well, maybe not Hoseok’s. It wasn’t a used bed, not when he rarely comes to this apartment. His being was in the dorm with the brotherhood he has grown to love, and his Yoongi hyung.
Yoongi hyung sips the hot chocolate, lips pressed to the edge of the curved brim, and elegant fingers wrapped around the mug.
Hoseok gulps down the drink, fingers on the handle.
A smile crawls onto his face. It’s the small things.
Yoongi hyung likes things to be organized in his calm way. Hobi likes to keep things clean in his joyful manner.
Hobi takes the finished mug out of the elder’s palms and places it on the bedside table along with his own drained one.
He presses himself to the side of the elder man, and pulls the blanket over their legs. Yoongi hyung isn’t exactly wearing sleeping clothes, but a hoodie, and sweatpants seemed okay to Hobi. Besides, Yoongi hyung would ask if he wanted to change. Yoongi hyung needs to sleep now.
Sleep before the thoughts fill the silence of the room, and invade his brain. Hobi knows the elder doesn’t let it all out, despite those thoughts overwhelming him. Hobi knows the elder will tell him of the matter bothering him when he is ready.
Now, Hobi needs to stop any malicious thoughts entering Yoongi hyung.
“Sleep?”
-
Hobi doesn’t get much sleep after that. Besides, he was already more than half way through his sleep when Yoongi hyung showed up.
He lies there watching the sleeping man.
Hands clasped together and placed between his thighs, head placed, tilted down, on the cotton of the pillow case, hair falling over his forehead, and closed eyes.
It’s been eleven years since he met this Angel of a human being.
His fingers hover over the elder’s hair.
*
“Hyung!” Hobi pushed the door open to the makeshift studio they had made in the dorm’s matchbox space. “Americano!”
Yoongi hyung turned in his chair and blinked up at Hobi with eyes that seemed to be open only with the barest strings of energy. Taehyung and Jungkook, the youngest two in their band of misfits, were in the corner of the room cuddled into a burrito..
“No Americano for you.”
Yoongi hyung rubbed his temples, about to say something, reaching for the Americano Hobi was pushing farther away from Yoongi hyung.
“No.”
Hobi simply pulled the elder out of his chair that was cushioned to comfort with clothes, and went behind to envelope them in a back hug.
Hobi smiled at the way Yoongi hyung simply slumped against him. Finally accepting the exhaustion.
“n…me”
“Huh?”
“Nap with me..” Yoongi hyung wrapped his pianist fingers around Hobi’s wrists. There is no force in the gesture. Just a request.
A frail corsage. One of the most prettiest corsages, unbuyable at the florist.
But Hobi feels his skin prickle with goosebumps. Something of a strain in his heart, and his chest: the feeling of the scrape of wings under his sternum.
He does follow the pale male onto the mattress.
He doesn’t sleep. Can’t. Not when his heart drums louder than the beats on the track Yoongi hyung had played for him the other day.
As a med student, he knows it’s just a simple reaction of his body to psychological things. But as he lays there looking at the way the lashes on Yoongi hyung’s eyelids knit together, like hands intertwining, he realizes.
An epiphany.
He loves Yoongi hyung more than just a best friend.
Hobi doesn’t have any control as his fingers form a path through the elder’s hair. And the elder just nuzzles into the palm of his hand.
-
Hobi doesn’t let his fingers card through the locks that look soft. He doesn’t want another ominous event happening.
He still very well remembers Yoongi hyung telling him with his morning voice, as he got up, “I have a girlfriend.”
He doesn’t want anything to happen that would make his heart with scars and band aids to be ready to peel off those, just to be slashed even deeper.
It’s okay to feel the press of guilt, a blade against his throat, for hiding this truth from his Yoongi hyung. So much better than the fear of losing a friend, and gathering the words to paint what he actually feels.
Fears and feelings and emotions and truths: things that are better left black and white, stick figures; if you dare to fill them in with colors, they become too dangerous.
Suga was the typical savage rapper. With the flow, the tongue, the fury, the spirit, the beat. But Suga was just a minor entity within Min Yoongi. Yoongi hyung was a human with all the love in the world. And he gave that love to anyone and everyone. It’s that same love that gives way to the fire dragon of Agust D.
When Hobi had met Yoongi hyung they had been merely teenagers with lanky figures and ardent hiphop devotees trying to emulate their idols. No one, even Hobi, expected to get attached to Yoongi.
The sunshine and the grumpy cat. It was amusing to so many people to see both of them. Hobi didn’t think it like that. Hobi simply gravitated towards Yoongi hyung, and his calm demeanor.
Yoongi hyung is snugly wrapped in the sheets when Hoseok gets up to make breakfast. The landscape outside is a snow eclipse. He needs to shovel a way, if their friends were to make it tonight. And even if a blizzard blows in, he is having this meetup.
Hoseok sighs as the water boils, mentally checking off things he needs to do today.
- Clear the path.
- Pick up the groceries.
- Finish the dinner he has planned.
- Talk with Yoongi hyung
- Have a shower before the guys arrive.
Hoseok breathes deeply as he moves the pan off the stove, and plates the omelette. He hopes Yoongi hyung will open up to him. The omelette doesn’t look much enticing, his tongue felt weird at the thought of eating so early. The clock is just pointing nearby seven.
He tugs on his coat and steps outside, ready to shovel away the snow.
It isn’t an easy job, but it does take his mind off things that potentially could be the reason Yoongi hyung was this upset, at the crack of dawn.
“How long have you been freezing your ass off?” Hobi swings around as he shovels half way through the snow, smiling widely at the voice.
“What’s the time now?” He asks, shoveling a bigger amount.
“A bit past eight fourty five.” Yoongi hyung steps outside with a shovel himself swaddled in one of Hobi’s extra jackets. Coming up to Hobis' side and begins to shovel along as well. “Did you even eat?”
“Yeah, hyung. I did,” Hobi heaves, leaning on the shovel and panting. Making it a bit dramatic in his stance and his movement. Something that he knows will make Yoongi hyung smile. Yoongi hyung shakes his head, chuckling. His hair ruffled, and astray is a nest for snowflakes that snuggle into the wispy threads, creating a microcosm of a galaxy.
The air is misted with Hobi’s exhales. Blurring his vision. But even in the blurred scenery he knows Yoongi hyung has a smile that is so small, you can miss it as he shovels away.
*
“Yoongi hyung!” Hobi calls from the door. “Should I go? You can sta-”
“No.” Yoongi hyung calmly walks out the door, taking the coat with him.
Hobi locks the house, and his keys are pried out of his fingers.
“Hyung!”
“What?” Yoongi hyung unlocks the car, and gets in the driver’s seat.
“This is my car~” Hobi whines. Even though it is useless.
“We both know, as well as everyone alive, that I’m the far better driver among the two of us.” He starts the engine. “Get in, Hoba.” Hobi harrumphs as he gets in the passenger seat. “Now,” Yoongi hyung teases as he pulls onto the road. “Don’t sulk.”
“You literally never let me drive!”
“I just like it better if I drive.”
“That’s a lie. You even let Jimin drive, who has a tendency to even lose his way while driving.”
“He, still, is careful,” Yoongi hyung’s fingers wrap around the shaft of the gear’s joystick, and he shifts it to the side. Towards Hobi’s thighs. “Why? Don’t you like hyung driving?” Those elegant fingers land on Hobi’s thighs.
“No, b-”
“Hyung just cares for you, Hoba.”
Hobi fights the blush on his cheeks, settling high and bright. Thank God it’s freezing.
-
“Just help me, and I’ll cook. Hmm?” Yoongi hyung slides his hands over Hobi's, taking the knife out of his hand.
“Yah!” Hobi almost jumps, but stays stable. “Am I not supposed to do anything today?” He complains as the elder pulls him by the waist.
“Well, you can help me by chopping up those veggies.” Yoongi hyung is a breeze of wind in the kitchen, fresh, and calming. He breezes around mixing ingredients and swiftly builds up most of the dishes.
Hobi cuts, washes, mixes, fries, and cleans. Only. Assistant chef Jung Hoseok.
-
They are setting the table, when Hobi remembers that Yoongi hyung had initially excused himself from the meetup to spend the New Year with his Girlfriend. Seohee. “Hyung?” He pauses.
“Hmm?” Yoongi hyung is placing the pairs of chopsticks on the table. Hobi bites on his lip. A bit unsure, and foreboding something not happy. But he needs his Yoongi hyung to open up to him.
“Weren’t you supposed to be with Seohee today?”
Hoseok regrets asking it immediately.
Yoongi hyung’s face, which had been a flower all this time, withers. Yoongi hyung’s fingers curl on the edge of the table. Eyes trained on the ceramic plate on the table. Lips pressed thin. Eyes stitched tight, with wrinkles in his lids. Hoseok moves without much thought. Limbs automated. Yoongi hyung leans into the hold of Hobi’s arms.
They aren’t much different in size. Maybe Hobi is a bit taller, but they fit. As they always do.
And Hobi feels good, after a very long time, to hold his hyung in his arms. Without the thought of feeling the guilt threatening to cut his throat and spill the truth with his blood like a waterfall. “We broke up.”
Hobi simply tightens himself around the artist. Trying to envelope himself as an armor, so that Yoongi hyung won’t feel the attacks. Only that this pain comes from within. And no exterior can be of use.
“Do you want to talk, hyung?” he mumbles into a shoulder blade. Yoongi hyung doesn’t say anything but holds onto the arms around him. They stand like that for a while, a long while.
“It’s just that….”
Silence.
Hoseok remembers when he had met Seohee for the first time.
*
Lee Seohee is a girl younger than him by a few weeks. Not a grandeur beauty, but a pleasant visage, easy on the eye.
He had a hand wound around Yoongi hyung’s waist. Her eyes had been a bit steely on his face.
“Hoba, this is Seohee.” Yoongi hyung turned around to face both of them. “Seohee, this is Hoseok. My best friend.” Hoseok knew from the way the back of his tongue burned he was still not used to having his heart locked away.
“Nice to meet you, Hoseok-ssi.” Seohee bowed, a wide stretch of lips. “I’ve heard so much about you.”
Hoseok was a bit confused at that. He had literally only known of the existence of such a girl, the day before. Hoseok tried to school his beyond control expressive face from acting like a cartoon character. But when he said, “Likewise”, and the girl raised an eyebrow in question, he realized maybe his expressive face would never not give him away.
Yoongi hyung smiled at him, a bit amused with the reactions on his face. Hoseok just leaned onto the elder, and laughed as the conversation flowed. Seohee seemed to have warmed up to him a bit, after a while. The waiter came up to them with a notebook, a very young girl.
“Hello! I’m Mina. What can I get you today?” Her tone was very bright, somewhat reminding Hoseok of himself.
“An espresso with a bit more sugar, and a vanilla sponge-cake piece for Hobi.” Yoongi hyung said without even letting the poor waiter scramble for her pen. “And an Iced Americano for me. Only that.”
The waitress scribbled it down, almost dropping the pen in a hurry. She sighed, smiling as she got the order correct. And turns to Seohee.
When the waitress comes back, she smiles and slips their drinks onto the table. Yoongi hyung’s and Hoseok’s drinks were put in matching glass mugs. But Hoseok didn’t think much. He had his chin hooked on Yoongi hyung’s shoulder, when the waitress came up to them with their bill.
‘Souls Saturdays' Discount was calculated for them, nearly making one and a half drinks free.
It turned out that it was a discount given to couples on Saturdays, when Yoongi hyung had finally told him that Seohee was his Girlfriend, and Taehyung had said to go there for their first date.
“Me and Kookie charm the waiters, all the time, there. The owner is a goner for young love. Because he had met his wife in a cafe on a Saturday.”
“Oh!” Hoseok had let out. “The waiters must have realized it immediately, before me.” Hoseok had felt his heart sink a bit even into the chasm of his chest.
Taehyung had been chased by Yoongi hyung for fooling him that night at their meetup.
“I didn’t hyung!” Taehyung had hidden behind Namjoon. “Tell him hyung, you brought your date there didn’t you? Last month on the second Saturday.”
Namjoon had blinked owlishly at being dragged into a warzone. Yoongi hyung had crossed his arms as he had plopped down beside Hoseok.
“The details you have are scary, but I’m not going to ask you how you know that.” Namjoon had stepped away from Taehyung. Jungkook had walked in then with Jin hyung, and Jimin, and Taehyung had made a run for it. Leaping into a projectile crashing on to the floor giggling on top of the youngest. “But Taehyung is right, hyung.” Namjoon had answered after chuckling, endeared by the youngest sappy couple. “That cafe does give those discounts, especially for dates, and couples.”
“Wait, didn’t you get one the last time you went though?” Jin hyung asks, shoving Namjoon’s legs off the couch and taking the pack of churros.
“Wha…” Yoongi hyung straightens at that, and then blinks at Hoseok. “Wait, you mean that ‘Souls Saturday’ is the discount?”
“Yep.”
“But-” Yoongi hyung looks at Hoseok, “Hoba.” He reaches out to poke the younger boy’s forearm. “Didn’t they give us last time?”
His head is tilted to the side, eyes wide. Reminding Hoseok of the kitten he had once taken out the tree, and had put it back on the ground.
“Um…yeah..”
“Last time, it was you three, right?” Jimin pipes up, eyes glinting an amused light.
“Yeah.”
“Maybe the waiter didn’t notice this time...” Jin hyung says. He glances at Hoseok with a question in his eyes. And Hoseok just nods.
“Hyungie, did you know…”
*
“I’m sorry hyung,” Hobi says. He doesn’t know what he should say. Between his heart soaring, and his chest flooding with a weird sensation, and the friend part in him screaming to comfort Yoongi hyung, he really doesn’t know what to say.
“No.”
“Hmm?”
“Don’t feel sorry…its-” Yoongi hyung is struggling, Hobi can feel that.
“It was a bit of a long relationship of yours, hyung.” Hobi soothes. “It’s okay to feel sad. Three years isn’t a joke.”
“That’s the thing. I-” Yoongi hyung’s fingers wrap around his own wrists like shackles. “I- I don’t feel like I should…”
Hobi is confused a bit, but he didn’t say anything as Yoongi hyung gathered his thoughts and words. Formulating the thoughts he had. Yoongi hyung was the best at words. If he was struggling to find them, it meant he was deeply troubled.
“Seohee wanted to end things.” An inhale. “But the thing was I was just confused why she was bringing it up all of a sudden. As in, only curiosity was there.” Their breathing was filling in the gaps between Yoongi hyung’s words. “So, I just asked her if there was any reason. And- and then she was furious.” Hobi didn’t like the sound of this. “She went on about how I’m a hypocrite, talking about being honest but using her. And she said, ‘Even now you don’t feel any pain.’ And I was shocked to see she was right.” Then the wobble in the voice reached Hobi’s ears.
Yoongi hyung was crying. The first drops fell on to Hobi’s skin enveloped around the elder. “It’s just- I am not meant for love, am I?” The question quivers in the air.
“No. Hyung, look at me.” Hobi does a revolution, and has the pale cheeks in his palm, cupped, looking up at him. “That is not true.”
His thumbs brush at the imminent tears hanging on to the lashes. His nails get coated in the saline layer. “You are the most lovable, and loving person I know. You are love, if it is up to me.”
Yoongi hyung doesn’t say anything except stare at the younger man holding him up. Hobi knocks their foreheads together. Their lashes brush, a bit, as he presses on.
“You deserve to be loved like a person’s own heart, like the earth loves the sky, and the moon loves the stars. I-”
Hobi pauses there. An abrupt pause. A miniscule thing, that crumbles as Yoongi hyung rasps out, “Then why can’t you, Hoba?”
Hobi pulls back at that, “Hyung-”
“If I deserve to be loved like those fancy things you just said, why can’t you love me?” Yoongi hyung asks, eyes shivering in a pool of tears.
“I- I-”
“Do you know why it hurts so much? Seohee breaking up? Because it was the confirmation that you won’t love me, like I want you to. I won’t be able to move on from you, even if I try.”
Yoongi hyung pulls away, stepping back. His fingers unfurled. A three. The thumb over the pinky finger, folded. “Three years. Three years I tried with her, to fall in love.”
Yoongi hyung rubs at his nose, and the wet lines formed down his cheeks. “I know it’s selfish of me to blame you. I know. But I’m not a saint. I fell in love with you, a long time ago, Hoba. Tried to give up. Tried to live with it. Tried to find love somewhere else. But I couldn’t let you go.” Then Yoongi hyung pulls Hobi —who is still paralysed— by the front. His nose against Hobi's. “Please don’t hate me, Hoba. Please. Please don’t-”
And Hobi kisses Yoongi hyung. It’s a wet kiss. A salty one. A slide of slippery surfaces. But it is still what Hobi, Hoseok, Jung Hoseok, wants his hyung, Yoongi hyung, Min Yoongi, Suga, Agust D, to know.
It’s a press of lips. A press of words. ‘It’s the same to me.’
It’s a plea. ‘Please don’t hate me.’
It’s a shout out. ‘I love you.’
Hobi gasps as he tilts his mouth down. Breathing. Gulping the cold air. As his upper lip still brushes Yoongi’s lower lip.
“You-” Yoongi hyung utters lips still brushing on Hobi’s.
“Me?” Hobi asks his own lips tracing the skin below the elder’s lips.
They don’t pull back, even as their lips brush, and their noses are squashed. They are both blind as their eyes are closed. Only the sound of each other. The feel of each other. If Hobi didn’t know better, he would think he was having a fever dream.
“How long?” Yoongi hyung whispers so faintly, it feels like the touch of wind.
“The day you said ‘I have a girlfriend.’…yeah..that day…”Yoongi hyung’s hands slide up and cup Hobi’s nape. Hobi’s own fingers are now splayed on Yoongi hyung’s hips.
“Three years.”
“Yeah.”
“Better than me, then.” Hobi’s eyes flutter open. He feels a bit dizzy as his eyesight clears.
“Better?” He asks eyebrows scrunching as he tries his best not to get cross eyed.
“I’m five.”
Hobi guffaws. Five years?!
Hobi feels his tongue trying to bend around to form the sound of his astonishment. “FIVE?!” he ends up whisper shouting.
“Could be longer…but yeah figured it out at my Graduation…so five..” Yoongi hyung’s fair skin becomes rosy, a blush.
Hobi feels a bit dizzy. No. Very much dizzy. And then the laughter tumbles out of him. Without control.
“What are you laughing at?” Yoongi hyung’s finger circles at the base of his throat, a chuckle follows as Hobi is unable to control his peal of laughter.
“We-” He tries to hold in the next string. “We’re idiots.” And lets it out again, falling into Yoongi hyung.
“Utter complete morosis.”
Hobi almost tumbles to the floor along with Yoongi hyung, they end up bruising their hips by crashing into the wooden corner of the table.
“What does ‘morosis’ mean?” Jungkook says with Taehyung’s arms acting as his belt, looking at Namjoon who had just declared their arrival.
“The stupidest of stupidities,” Namjoon answers as Jin hyung walks past him towards the kitchen.
“Yah!” He calls on his way. “Let the idiots be. Poor things just sorted through their shit. Don’t embarrass them.”
“But that’s what we live for!” Jimin jumps from behind the youngest two, as if he was hiding.
Hobi turns to Yoongi hyung to confirm he wasn’t the only one who didn’t know the guys had already arrived. Yoongi hyung’s feline eyes are blinking owlishly, for the first time clueless.
“Don’t look at each other, hyung.” Taehyung chimes. “You two were busy laughing to hear us opening the door.”
Jungkook chuckles. “Yep. Heard it through the door.”
“At least I don’t have to suffer through the pining forces in the studio every time Hobi visits, anymore.” Namjoon mumbles as he drags a chair out, and sits on it.
“Everyone at the table!” Jin hyung shouts as he brings the main dish to the dining table.
Jimin skips into the kitchen, with the waddling younger couple in the group following.
Hobi is still processing things, when Yoongi hyung grumbles, “Little shits.”
And Hobi falls into a fit of laughter, again.
-
Hoseok believes that maybe dreams do come true, as he watches Yoongi hyung walk up to him as they all get up to count down. “Ten.” Namjoon starts. Yoongi hyung’s toes press against Hobi’s. “Nine!” Jimin pings, cheery as he rocks on his balls. Yoongi hyung’s fingers slide up Hobi’s forearms.
Hobi is lost in the enigma of Min Yoongi, the love of his life, when those lips part around “Three.” He fills in, “Two.” Yoongi hyung is smiling as he pulls Hoseok by the collar. And the last thing Hobi is capable of deciphering is Taehyung screaming “ONE!”.
His new year blooms as soft lips crash into his.